“Haptics” relates to a tactile and force feedback technology that takes advantage of the sense of touch of a user by applying haptic feedback effects (i.e., “haptic effects”), such as forces, vibrations, and motions, to the user. Devices, such as mobile devices, touchscreen devices, and personal computers, can be configured to generate haptic effects. In general, calls to embedded hardware capable of generating haptic effects (such as actuators) can be programmed within an operating system (“OS”) of the device. These calls specify which haptic effect to play. For example, when a user interacts with the device using, for example, a button, touchscreen, lever, joystick, wheel, or some other control, the OS of the device can send a play command through control circuitry to the embedded hardware. The embedded hardware then produces the appropriate haptic effect.
Haptics has been leveraged in recent technological advances to enhance the virtual experience of events such as live sports games, concert shows, fashion shows, comedy gigs, television episodes, etc. To that end, corresponding haptic effects may be delivered via various means, for example, via traditional media such as radio or television, via Internet based new media such as news streams and mobile applications, or via event virtual reality platforms such as the Oculus Rift head mounted display (“HMD”) by Oculus Virtual Reality. While such technologies make it possible for a user to “attend” an event remotely via a virtual channel, they may not provide a full experience of the ambience of a live event as it would have been experienced when attending the event in person.